Consequence
by richard the pedantic
Summary: A group of exiles fight to exact vengeance on the Merovingian after he has one of their number tortured to death. A grisly tale is this. Chapter 3 is up
1. Variable

**Greetings all, what follows is the result of a moment of inspiration and a largely uneventful Friday evening. I don't think I'm ripping off anyone's idea but if I have then sorry about that and let me know.**

**I've run out of witty disclaimers so I'll have to settle for a simple, I don't own the Matrix, I'm just stealing it for a while.**

**P.S. In case this story gives any ideas to the contrary, I do not condone any of the grim vile things you'll see. This story aint for the faint hearted types.**

**Consequence**

By Richard Paul.

Chapter 1: Variable

**May 17th 2007**

**Fear's perspective**

There were seven of us in the room with her, four on guard, myself included. Each of us were armed with nothing but swords. We didn't need guns for this, hell we probably didn't even need to be there, we were mainly decorative figures, minor ego boosts to the Merovingian perhaps.

The Twin programs were also there, hovering about the prey like circling vultures, their hands gliding gracefully over the neatly stacked instruments of pain that adorned the walls and two tables at the side. I almost envied them.

There was also his Lordship the Merovingian himself, looking with smug eyes at the defenceless victim that was tied to the large pylon, he was standing quite close to the door, maybe he was worried he'd have to run if she broke free.

I doubted that was the case after a moment's thought, the steel wire we'd used would cut her bare skin to pieces if she struggled too much; it was part of the reason why we had chosen it. It's hard to stand perfectly still when you see a white hot iron or a sharp blade coming towards you. He knew that, I never figured out why he was standing there, I didn't care that much either, its kind of strange that my mind chose to ponder this pointless question during the waiting period rather then focus fully on the naked, bound female in the centre of the room.

God she really was beautiful. Well, at the time she was.

Her face bore the typical mask of bored resignation, but the fear was, as usual, obvious, as was the feeling of hopelessness, the realisation that her life was nearing its end and that this end would slowly redefine the definition of pain for her.

From across the room, Veneration, who also found herself on guard duty,gave me a familiar grin of anticipation. I returned it and then noticed her face snap back into its previous nonchalant state as she presumably received a rebuking glance from the Merovingian, annoyed at the slight disruption in his moment of triumph.

We waited for a few more minutes, letting the woman, HaleI think her name was, enjoy her terror for a few moments more before we got started.

"Are you ever going to get on with it?" She asked finally, her voice filled with iron and her face now remarkably composed; very impressive, "Come on, get this over with and quit staring, my tits aren't that impressive."

He flinched at that, Merv was remarkably easy to offend. Those in his employ often had to ensure that they did not maintain eye contact for too long or break it too early when dealing with him, and also that they did not step on the cracks in the floor tiles and breath in through their mouths. Ok I made the last two up but it's not too far from the truth.

"As you wish," He said after some further flinching. His face now bore a smug, overly elaborate grin, the kind you'd expect to see on a cartoon villain as he twiddled his bushy moustache.

He gestured to the Twins; they nodded, also grinning albeit with far more composure and dignity. They moved to opposite corners of the room and selected two long slender white hot irons from the buckets of hot coals.

Still grinning, they moved slowly towards Hale, lowering their torture devices and pointing them towards her like two jousters.

They held them next to her for a moment; her mouth I noticed was now clenched tightly shut, as were her eyes. She was trying to block out the world around her, and trying to resist the urge to scream. I would have laughed at the futility of that but I guessed that she didn't know much about this pastime.

In unison, they plunged their irons to roughly the same spot on her left thigh.

She was able to resist screaming for maybe half a second. Then the room almost shook with her pained shriek.

The Twins hastily retracted the irons, careful to avoid significantly damaging any nerve endings, if they seared too much they might damage one too many pain receptors.

Hale's screams grew progressively quieter and she managed to hold them off for a few seconds in between to draw in a few hasty lungfuls of oxygen. I noticed her arms, (that had been suspended above her head), were squirming slightly, she was trying to bring her hands down to cradle her wound, only to find them restricted and tormented by her steal bonds. After a final quiet groan of pain, she locked eyes with Merovingian, they were almost blazing with hatred and determination.

I watched on with a curious mix of arousal and admiration. Normally people who found themselves within this dreary corner of the Merovingian's domain begged for their doomed lives before they were exposed to any physical pain whatsoever. This woman, so far, had maintained a degree of composure despite the apparently excruciating pain she had already been exposed to.

It was far too early to tell if this would last however, and my instincts told me that it wouldn't.

The Merovingian gestured to the Twins once more, who had returned to the coal buckets to re-heat their already overheated pokers.

It was her right thigh this time, and her reaction had been almost identical to the first, although this time her breathing seemed more chaotic, and her involuntary struggling brought about its own groans of pain.

I noticed her legs move this time as well, maybe they had the first time, I don't know. I guessed that her body was attempting to force itself into a crouching position, and that its attempts at lessening the pain brought about more harm then good.

Nevertheless, her eyes remained alert; she still seemed more then capable of ripping all our throats out if she got the chance.

I was a little surprised to see the Twins stow their irons after this, I'd often seen them wreak havoc on humanoid frames with those things over the space of several hours. Maybe the attack on her thighs was just a taster of what was to come.

Next they went for her hands, initially without the assistance of any tools. Each taking a hand, they took one of her slender fingers in their own gloved ones, and snapped them. The audible cracks echoed in the room, as did her screams. She tried to clench her fingers, move her hands or do anything to keep the bones in her fingers intact for a second longer. Her efforts were, obviously, fruitless. Soon all her fingers were motionless broken tubes on the ends of her hands.

Walking around in front of her, one of the twins drew his hand across his face, wiping a layer of sweat and a few stray hairs away from her eye. The look on his face was that of a predator tormenting its prey before the final kill, or more specifically, one of sadistic delight.

Hale, summoning all of her strength, lunged her head towards the hand and closed her teeth around two of the Twins fingers, these instantly dematerialised and shifted to their ethereal, green ghost like state, with one 'out of phase' hand, the Twin moved his limb through Hale's face, down to her left shoulder. Shortly after it arrived there, she started screaming again.

Now the way they explained this to me after we were finished is that, he solidified certain areas of his hand so that they closed around and pinched certain nerves. The result was similar to getting a knife in the shoulder.

There were times I envied them, more often then not however I was happy enough as I was.

Anyway, that's not important. They took a medium sized mallet from one of the tables next and with it they smashed the bones in Hale's hands to splinters. She screamed, but this scream was interrupted by a sudden expulsion of bile from her throat; almost instantly the odour of vomit mixed with the already unpleasant odours of blood and burned flesh. Lovely.

I buried my head under my shirt and breathed in the scent of my deodorant. It smelt heavenly compared to what I could smell in the room, although the two smells did seem to intermingle somewhat.

Against all odds, I noticed that she smiled slightly despite the pain, presumably at the puddle of vomit now trailing down one of the Twin's face and chest. After a quick displeased glance at himself, the Twin shifted to his ghostly form, and the vomit fell to the floor was a graceless splat. Hale just seemed to shrug at this sight.

It was remarkable. In spite of everything, all the crippling wounds and severe pain, in spite of the sheer hopelessness of her situation, she still resisted us. My admiration returned.

They moved onto her feet next, with a jug full of boiling hot water that had been resting near one of the hot coal buckets. They let the steaming water trickle onto her feet and sear the skin. Hale staggered as this new method of torture continued, her body now less able to keep upright, now having to rely more on the painful restraints.

She was still screaming, but there was something in her scream that I can only describe as resignation. Whereas the first few screams had been filled with outrage, shock and horror, now the sound of it was familiar in her own ears, it was less horrifying.

This all continued for another hour and a half, the Twins attacking different sections of Hale's body with assorted tools. As they were busy carving strips of flesh out of Hale's legs, the Merovingian spoke up suddenly.

(I'd almost forgotten he was there,)

"One moment." He said amiably.

The Twins, without so much as a disappointed sigh, pushed themselves to a standing position and moved to the side. The Merovingian walked towards the battered woman who now looked like a weary shell of her former self, to her credit she hadn't begged once.

"Is there something you'd like to say to me?" He asked, his voice dripping with nauseating pride.

"What?" Hale asked weakly, she sounded unsure of who she was talking to.

"I said do you have anything you want to say to me? I think it'd be in your best interests really, don't you?"

She spluttered a few times, coughing blood into Merv's face before slurring the words,

"I won't betray them; you'll have to find them on your own you piece of shit."

"Oh I wasn't talking about them; your death should be all we need to draw them into our web. What I want from you is an apology."

She almost laughed; so did I.

"There is never any action without reaction. If you displease me then you shall pay the consequences." (Oh God, not the causality speech again), "You killed one of my servants, you got what you deserved. Now," he moved his head closer to hers, "Apologise; and I'll make it quick."

It was amazing. Even with all her injuries, severe blood loss and God knows what else, she still managed to force enough strength into herself to plunge her head at the Merovingian's, landing a headbut that caused a thick trail of blood to flow down his nose.

He cursed once loudly in French before turning back towards the exit, he motioned for the Twins to continue where they had left off, but after a quick glance, it appeared that Hale had at last died. Strange, usually even the feeblest of prey lasted longer then this, then again, maybe she did it herself. Disciplined minds I've heard can stop their own hearts, this is true even for programs, at least I think that's true, in any case, she was dead.

Merv cursed again, more quietly this time. He motioned for two guards to deal with Hale's body and for the rest of us to follow him back to the Chateau.

Now we just had to wait for the others. Simple.

**To be continued.**


	2. Cause

**Thanks to LadySmith for reviewing. With any luckI shall read one of your fics within the next five hours.**

**Unfortunatlyall updates will not be this quick.**

**Chapter 2: Cause**

**February 19th 2007**

**Flame's perspective**

The envoy was late. I can't say that was surprising, we already knew what the message would be, and by being late, he helped to convey his master's contempt for us 'lesser beings'.

It was a shame that with his rise to power he could not find a way to keep a residue of humility. His ego was larger then his empire, it made everything more complicated. The arrogance brought with it such tedious, time consuming rituals as these. Everything had to be done in a way that fit in with his views on how the artificial world should be run.

It was also nauseating.

"Where the fuck are they?" Torrent half shouted for the fourth time.

"Calm down" I replied, trying to make the following sigh seem more exasperated that anticipatory.

I looked down at my drink, raised the glass halfway to my lips, held it there for a second and then returned it to the table. I just wanted to get this over with.

To my left I noticed Rebus scanning the room continuously. With the exception of Hale, she was the one who had been able to hide their anticipation with the most success and adopt an expression of nonchalant calm. In the field of poker faces however, Hale was unrivalled. I envied her for that.

The now quarter of an hour late envoy was a servant of the Merovingian. He was, in all probability coming to 'offer' us a place within the ranks of his minions. It was what always happened whenever his influence within a city or town in the Matrix became worthwhile. He didn't like the idea of stray exiles running around in his territory, so he either recruited them into his services, or he had them killed. All over the city there were exiles getting pestered by the Merovingian's messengers. Either they'd accept his offer, or they'd be hunted down one by one.

We had decided on a third option.

The last member of our group, Silent, was silent. He hadn't said anything since we'd got here. He was staring at the table as if waiting in line for his own beheading. I avoided looking in his direction after I first noticed his depressed state. His pessimism wasn't doing much for my state of mind.

I cast another glance towards the clock. Two minutes had passed since I'd last looked at it. I shook my head in disgust at my own nervousness. This wasn't even the hard part.

"Fear." The sudden sound of an unfamiliar voice broke me out of my somewhat chaotic train of thought. I looked to my left, where the voice had sounded and I noticed two immaculately dressed, forgettably hansom programs. I half expected them to follow up this statement with some unoriginal cliché such as 'You all reek of fear.' or something similar.

"My name is Fear" The one on my left, a male with tanned skin and medium length almost painfully white hair, said instead. "This is Reclamation."

He gestured to the second program, another male with much shorter brown hair said nothing, said nothing. He simply inserted himself into one of the two unused chairs at the table. He started staring at each of us for a few seconds. Rebus shot him a reproachful glance and then joined the rest of us in ignoring him. By the looks of things, this 'Fear' guy was the one we should pay attention to.

"You know why I'm here right?" He said, taking a chair next to his companion, "The Merovingian has sent us out to give the recruitment pitch to more potential employees. We're also supposed to say that refusing this offer can be very bad for your health." He paused a few moments, a small smile appeared on his face, "You have to imagine we said that in a fierce and daunting tone of voice."

Reclamation glared at him then, he seemed to be taking the whole thing a lot more seriously then Fear and didn't seem to appreciate his partner's light hearted attitude.

"Yes, we know why he sent you." My voice now felt as calm as I did. You know hw it is when you dread the approach of something, but when it comes your fear and anticipation vanishes and all that's left is calm determination? Anyway, after a second long pause I continued, "And we're not interested."

"Are you sure?" He asked, not fazed in the slightest by our refusal; Reclamation on the other hand seemed ready to lunge at me. "It's not a bad line of work, decent pay, reasonable hours, all you have to put up with is the occasional overly pretentious character. Besides, if you don't take this job you'll be killed, remember?"

This last sentence was delivered with the same light hearted tone of voice as he'd used to outline the perks of the job. He'd done this a fair few times before.

"That remains to be seen." I replied, "Go back and tell your master that we are not interested in joining the ranks of his minions. Whilst you're at it, tell him that anyone he sends after us will meet a swift untimely end."

I know how stupid that sounds. Trust me though; it wasn't just foolhardy bravado bullshit. We'd fought whilst outnumbered before, and we'd emerged triumphant. We'd do the same here, they'd come after us, obviously, but after the Merovingian lost a sufficient number of minions trying to hunt us down, he'd realise that trying to kill us wasn't worth the collateral damage.

Reclamation smirked, Fear sat still with a look of calm resignation in his eyes. He'd undoubtedly heard similar speeches before now, all most probably from foolish, new exiles with not enough experience of the world outside of their original function to recognise mortal danger.

"Fair enough," He said after a few seconds, "Nice meeting you Flame."

I wasn't really surprised that he knew my name. The Merovingian had a reputation for knowing little short of everything in the Matrix.

He stood up and began to walk towards the bar's exit.

"Wait!" This screech came from Reclamation, deciding at last to say something. Looking in his direction, as he hastily made his way over to where Fear was standing, I noticed that he'd turned red with anger.

"Yes?" Fear asked wearily.

"Fair enough? That's all you have to say. We don't just let retards like this treat us like that. We have to…"

"We?" Fear looked at his comrade as if he'd just asked what a door was. After a second he turned towards me, "Why I always get stuck with the infants I'll never know." He then turned his head back towards Reclamation, "Look kid, sooner or later you're going to learn how truly insignificant men like you and me are. To his Lordship the arsehole we're just tools, tools that can be replaced, and we'll never be more then that. Accept that and stop trying to live up to your deluded ambitions and you'll be surprised how much better li..."

Halfway through the word 'life', Reclamation landed a punch on Fear's jaw that sent him staggering backwards several paces. I'm not sure if it was because he called him infant or because he was standing on his hopeless dreams that Reclamation decided to clout Fear, I guessed the latter. By the looks of him, this young program had delusions of ascending to the ranks of the Merovingian's trusted, feared and respected right hand man. Or maybe even his paramour.

Fear rubbed the spot where he'd been struck and stared with genuine amusement at his partner.

"You'll see kid." He said, checking the area for any blood, there was none.

"You worthless piece of shit." Reclamation was shouting now in genuine outrage, a number of faces turned towards the screeching idiot. "You may be happy to eat shit for the rest of time, but I'm not like you, I don't have to settle for some lowly position. I can…"

He kept talking but that last bit is all I can remember. Me, Hale and Torrent started laughing at about this point. I think we were loud enough to attract another round of glares from the bar's other patrons.

Eventually he fell silent and turned to glare at us. His face was that of someone ready to lunge at the closest person and try and rip their throat out with his teeth.

Remarkably, he managed to resist the temptation and instead waited for our laughter to die out. This didn't take too long. In the corner of my eye however I also noticed Fear fighting back laughter of his own.

Reclamation moved back to the table. He then leaned forward and rested his hands on its metallic surface.

"Laugh on," He said calmly, "When he finds you, I'll be the one laughing. You'll all be screaming till your last fucking breath." He turned his head towards Hale, his mouth twisted to form a sickening, lecherous grin, "I think I'll enjoy your final hours a lot. Especially if…"

I'd started reaching for my knife about halfway through that sentence. Hale got to hers first however.

It was a fine shot; of course I'd expect nothing less from her. The knife smashed through the guy's skull and buried itself within his forehead. He was dead before he had time for one shocked breath.

As the body fell backwards, people in the bar were starting to notice the dead guy with the knife in his cranium. Screams broke out almost in succession. Some people bolted for the doors, others cowered by the walls. One person I noticed was punching numbers into his phone. I cast a warning glance in his direction and he froze. A few seconds later he slowly placed the phone on the table and sat back in his seat.

After the screaming had died down, a deathly silence filled the room. People were making a conscious effort not to breathe. Believing that the sound of their breath would be loud enough to drive us to burry a knife in their skulls.

I was hoping to avoid something like this, by which I mean a viewing audience as opposed to a fatality. The idea had been to kill whoever the Merovingian sent our way, (simply to make ourselves a priority an get this over with more quickly), and then run like Hell. It seemed like the better option. None of us were willing to serve that bastard and none of us would lie down and die. We had intended to do this out of public view however. We had enough to deal with without law enforcement types.

As Hale was reclaiming her knife from Reclamation's head, Fear spoke again.

"This is why we always need new people." He paused for a moment, staring at the corpse as if he was staring at a floor tile. It meant nothing to him. "Run," He said to me after the moment had passed, "Run now."

I thought I could hear traces of genuine concern in his voice. In retrospect I very much doubt that this was the case.

We let Fear live. One death was all we really needed. Besides, there was something about this guy that I liked.

After a moment's pause in which the whole situation finally started to sink in, we ran.

**To be continued**


	3. Evaluation

**Sorry for the wait and thanks to Wolfie for the review.**

**Chapter 3: Evaluation**

**Fear's Perspective**

"So um, refresh my memory, what was his name?"

I wasn't really surprised that he didn't remember his name, truth be told I was a little surprised that he remembered that Reclamation was male.

"Reclamation sir." I replied, making a careful effort not to show anything in my voice other then nonchalance. Showing any other emotion when dealing with the Merovingian could be dangerous. Look too happy, sad, angry, bored, resentful, thirsty, and he might decide that his minions were getting too uppity and dispose of the potential troublemaker. It had happened before.

"Reclamation yes, interesting name, anyway tell me why exactly they killed him."

"The best I can tell, it happened when he insulted one of them, or was about to, they killed him halfway through his sentence."

"Temperamental wouldn't you say?" He said to Persephone, who as always looked like she was holding back the urge to lunge at the Merovingian with a meat cleaver. She muttered something noncommittal, I didn't hear what exactly.

I never could figure her out, for centuries she had been by the Merovingian's side and with each passing day here soul seemed to die a little more. All she ever seemed to do was sit next to him and stare at things. Well, that's all I knew her to do, what she did in her own time was a mystery. Still, if I were her, I probably would have put a gun to my head several hundred years ago.

"So tell me," the Merovingian's words caused my wandering mind to snap back to attention, "Why is it that they didn't kill you. I would have thought that they'd take the opportunity to dispatch as many of us as possible."

'_Us'_, he always used that word. The image of a single organism with him as the monstrously vain head.

"I'm not sure sir. I wasn't as," I paused, searching for the right word, "Flamboyant as Reclamation was. I would guess that I didn't provoke them enough to make them want to kill me."

"And didn't you think to strike at them? Your partner lying dead, our enemies revelling in a victory over us, a blow against me? You didn't think to defend our reputation? I doubt I need to tell you how effective a tool that is."

_Oh yes Now why didn't do that?. Why didn't I take on five armed programs, all of whom undoubtedly adept in combat and die in the process so as to defend your ego you worthless prick?_

I didn't say that. God knows I wanted to.

"If I had fought them sir, I would have died," I said matter-of-factly, my composure was becoming harder to maintain, but not impossible. "There were too many of them, and they were easily as good as any of us."

This statement was accompanied with a gesture at the two Uzi wielding guards who flanked me.

"You know that for certain do you?"

"Yes sir. I felt it was better to wait so that we could hunt them down later with suitable numbers."

"I see. Did you deliver any warnings about the fate that will now befall them?"

"Yes sir I did, per your instructions." I'm not sure why saying 'your instructions' made me feel better. It didn't much matter, me following orders wouldn't factor much into his decision. If anything I may have hurt my chances of survival. Since he is of course the _all knowing, infallible_ Merovingian, if a plan of his failed it was because someone else failed him.

"And they didn't seem too disturbed by this. Are you sure that you delivered the message in a suitable fashion?"

I narrowly avoided grinning at the memory, my tone of voice had been as daunting as a sparrow.

"Yes sir, I think the way we delivered the message was suitable. They seemed to be under the impression that they were in a position to resist us."

"I find that hard to believe," he said with a frown. _Oh shit. _"All exiles know of our strength, a strength that surpasses the creators and operators of this virtual farm. Surely they had to know that they couldn't oppose my will."

"Overconfidence blinds logic sir." I said quickly, praying that he wouldn't think I was patronising him, "If they are, as I believe they are, borderline psychotic fools with at least one fatality each to their credit, they may have come to the conclusion that they are invincible. I have seen this before."

"As have I." He said with a glare. I said nothing.

For a while after that he just stood there and stared at me, occasionally taking a sip from the doubtlessly highly expensive Champaign on the table. I remained still, forcing myself to project the image of calm. Maybe in retrospect it would have been better to look a little nervous, I certainly felt nervous, and an image of feeble inferiority might make me seem less of a potential renegade.

Or it may have just made me seem nauseating and made him want to kill me all the more. This wasn't a predictable situation.

"One last question," he said, his eyes boring into mine, "In your opinion, is Reclamation's untimely demise any great loss to us?

"No sir, the kid was an idiot, through and through, if he'd listened to me instead of the testosterone filled voices in his head then he'd probably still be alive."

Thank God he found that funny. After laughing for two or three seconds he returned to his staring. Maybe he was hoping to find some trace of fear in my expression.

"Very well," he said finally, "You may leave."

"Thank you sir." I said, now trying to hide the relief in my voice. (This was more a matter of pride then survival). With that I turned and made my way out of the door.

When I felt that I was sufficiently far away from the Merovingian, and everyone else for that matter, I let out a huge sigh of relief and collapsed into a sitting position on the floor. I remained motionless for a few moments, enjoying the quiet and the cool air.

So that was that, I was officially off the endangered list and all we had to do now was hunt down another group of defiant exiles.

A part of me that refused to die started to feel sorry for them, after all they were people with ordinary, happy lives and we had waltzed in and shattered them, and they would pay for wanting to be free. It was the same thing that had happened God only knows how many times before; the strong dominating the weak. Age old story, fact of life, and yet even though I would help create one more example of this rule, and probably enjoy myself whilst doing so, part of me, the part of the young exile blinded by childish concepts of honour, felt sorry for them.

_Just push it down where it belongs, _I told myself, _You can't save them, and you don't want to._

"Still alive then?" Looking up I saw Kyla standing above me, smiling at my obvious relief which doubtlessly preceded terror.

"Still alive I confirmed."

"I guess I owe Salient a lunch," she said, sitting herself down next to me, "What was it like?"

"Not as bad as I thought it would be," I replied truthfully, "Pretty standard questions, I didn't have to make too much up and he wasn't in the homicidal mood by the looks of things."

Kyla pulled a slightly crumpled cigarette packet from her pocket and offered me one, I refused. She shook one from the packet, lit it and soon smoke poured from the end of the tube. I watched as it twisted within itself as it slowly dissipated into the air. In my current frame of mind, the simple beauty of it seemed somewhat relaxing. The smell however was far from it. I edged to my left slightly, trying to get away from it. Kyla edged up next to me and unleashed another wave of odorous gas into the air.

"So we're going exile hunting I take it?" She said after a few more moments of silence.

"I'd guess so, I'd better dig the net out of the attic."

She laughed, sort of. It was a nice thing to hear.

"Do you want to get out of here?" she asked, making no attempt to hide the boredom in her voice, "Staring at the walls can't be much fun."

"You're right, it isn't." I said, pushing myself to my feet. She did the same a few moments later. Discarding her cigarette on the elaborate marble floor, (in a section of the building free from any bothersome security cameras. The Merovingian doesn't take too kindly to littering either), we made our way to the exit.

**To be continued.**


End file.
